Miyamoto assisting developers with GamePad exclusive projects

Last week we learned that Nintendo plans on unveiling several new games that utilize the GamePad almost exclusively. Satoru Iwata has spoken about these projects briefly, saying that some are nearly complete and these will be the games showcased at E3 next month. According to Iwata, legendary designer Shigeru Miyamoto has helped with the design of some of these projects.

Also, at that time, we will introduce multiple games that are designed to introduce players to the value of the Wii U Game Pad by demonstrating playstyles only possible because of it. These titles have been developed by internal teams under the guidance of Mr. Miyamoto (Board Member, General Manager of the Development Division). The software titles that we will show at E3, which make use of the Game Pad, will range from near complete titles to titles that are early in development, but will demonstrate the titles’ core appeals. We are preparing multiple software like this for the show.

This is good news for Nintendo, since one of the many criticisms leveled at the company as of late is that their recent games no longer feature GamePad integration that is meaningful. A good example of this is the release of Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze, which supported off-screen play using the GamePad, but while playing the game on the TV, the GamePad remains black with no features.

Are you excited to see what Miyamoto and his developers have been working on?

Ah yes, for some reason I thought you said Miyamoto. My apologies I also must have been half asleep.

Thomas Vienna

Thank God! I bought the Wii U for a lot of reasons, but the Gamepad was obviously what the selling point was. I can’t wait!

Rinslowe

Miyamoto is the one dude I’d most like to meet in person.

jjbredesen

Yeah he seems like a really cool person! Relaxed,humble and Calm, but at the same time very playful and does not give a shit what people think about him

And the man is a genius!

Thomas Vienna

From what I’ve read in Iwata Asks, he’s a lot different working for him than he is in the press, but they didn’t dare explain how.

Rinslowe

If the guy wasn’t a professional as much as he is an innovative artist I would probably be disappointed…

Actually no I wouldn’t lol, the guy is a legend

darkcreap

Um, yes, also read that. I hope it does not mean he tortures his employees or something.

jjbredesen

Well i do know that he is extremely strict and all about the quality, but that is his job, i think he is a more relaxed person in private, but we don’t know him, so hard to tell.

tlopuse

Me too!!!!

readypembroke

Great Idea: Shigeru Miyamoto tours America! Meet the Japanese video game mastermind responsible for Mario live and in PERSON!! Tickets start at $20! Better hurry up or you’ll be saying MAMA MIA!!

Rinslowe

A chance meeting would be preferred. But if he ever decided to host such an event. I would be there for sure.

linxz

ok i can’t wait, but i keep my fingers crossed…not the first time Nintendo has disappointed.

Mr Ninty

dear god in heaven. i know we dont get along, but if you can get nintendo to make a new starfox that would be great

jhell

This is great news

snaek

Haven’t been this hyped for a Nintendo E3 in a long time!
Between Zelda, these new Gamepad-utilizing games, and possible 1st party announcements like Metroid, this may be one of their best!

Ducked

How about Nintendo working with Square Enix on gamepad exclusives for Kingdom Hearts III!

jjbredesen

Would be cool, but not happening :/

Mario

A guy can dream. Right?

jjbredesen

Yup :), but dreaming does normally result in let downs, a twisted perception of reality and in even depression

Ducked

But it can happen. The Wii U audience has much bigger interest in Kingdom Hearts III than the Xbox audience, and possibly even the PS4. They asked what fans want in the future of the series, it just may come to Wii U

Jon Turner

Also remember SE NEVER ONCE SAID THEY WOULDN’T BRING IT TO WIIU. So the possibility is still open. Hopefully SE and Nintendo can work something out.

Ducked

Hopefully. Both companies are going to have to put time and effort into it.

http://valid.at val berger

Iwata and his henchmen just need to move over to that SE-Tower, knock knock, tell them how lovely they do look like today and CHA-CHING Kingdom Hearts in tha houze.

seriously, If Nintendo would move toward SE, offer them some good deal or something, SE might be into this. Or might have been as that train might have left the station.

Michael v.

there’s still a possibility for something for the sorts to happen who knows. I don’t expect KH III to be out any time soon seeing how long it’s taken them at this point. So there are potential chance between now and then.

It’s all a wait and see situation i guess.

http://facebook.com/validgraphics val berger

I guess everything depends on how sales are gonna be developing after MK8 launches, Nintendo has unveiled their E3 madness and Smash Bros is on the horizon. some developers, especially Japanese ones, might get easily convinced to return to that N-Train.

matthew garcia

I don’t think square Enix would want to waste there time and money downgrading it for Wii u

lonewolf

Yes they just dont want to make games for the better system.

matthew garcia

The so called better system is selling horribly I’m sure that has something to do with it also

lonewolf

The dreamcast sold horrible as well but it was a way better system than ps2 and the xbox same goes for the gamecube. Sales do not means better console.

http://macromanjr.blogspot.com/ Brian Lockett

To be fair, you brought up the case of “better.” Matthew brought up the case that Square Enix probably wouldn’t spend any extra effort revising their long-awaited next-gen game for Wii U. Even a downgrading port takes money, effort and time–more than what the Wii U is proving to be at the moment. If they did port to Wii U, only a niche portion of an already small demographic of Wii U owners would buy it. At the moment, it wouldn’t be very profitable for them to put KH3 on Wii U.

Darius

“If they did port to Wii U, only a niche portion of an already small demographic of Wii U owners would buy it” you dont know this for sure. Plus the Wii U still has a bigger base than the xbone and slightly smaller than the ps4 so why even bother making for those consoles? according to that logic they should only make kh3 for the ps3, 360 and wii or better yet the 3ds its definitely has the bigger install base

http://macromanjr.blogspot.com/ Brian Lockett

Are you serious, dude?

They’re putting the game on Xbox One because they can port the PS4 version over to it with little cost to their budget or effort. They’re similar in power and once you make it for PS4, the Xbox One gets an easy port.

They’re going with PS4 primarily because PlayStation has overwhelmingly their franchise’s highest demographic. Plus, you claim that PS4 has a “slightly smaller” base is not quite true.

PlayStation’s only been out for six months, and you’re going to compare that to the year and a half the Wii U has had a chance to well exceed the PS4’s current sales? Are you serious going to count its base as slightly larger?

PS4 has only seen early adopter sales so far–most of its consumers are simply waiting for the better games to come along before buying one. Many are simply waiting for the better PS4 games to arrive, but they will surely buy one.

Also, Kingdom Hearts fans are among some of the staunchest fans out there. They give Final Fantasy VII fans a good run for their money in terms of fan loyalty and expectation. They have been waiting a very long time for this game, with high expectations.

Most fans simply aren’t going to be satisfied by a scaled-down version of the game just for fitting the Wii U’s power limitations, for a game they’ve waited an entire decade to see–not even among those who do own a Wii U.

With doing everything from lowering the models’ poly counts to reducing texture sizes to make sure everything runs smoothly, it’d be almost like working on a new game just for fitting into Wii U’s lower horsepower. Ain’t nobody got time for that.

Though, my point before was just that the demographic among the small lot of Wii U owners out there just isn’t enough incentive. Even a demographic of Wii U owners hungry for games doesn’t really mean that they’re all RPG fans.

Even Zelda games aren’t typically Nintendo’s best-selling games in recent years. We RPG fans are a niche market–a sizable demographic but a niche nonetheless. This is especially true with modern Nintendo consoles.

Darius

are you serious dude? im going to keep this short because i have a life. The 3ds also had a slow start. ” Plus, you claim that PS4 has a “slightly smaller” actually i never claimed that. After you write an essay maybe you should proof read and check your sources
“Plus the Wii U still has a bigger base than the xbone and slightly smaller than the ps4″
I see your passion but i can tell that you kinda know what you’re
talking about but at the same time you kinda dont lol and arguing
is annoyingly overrated not really my thing :/ so good day

http://macromanjr.blogspot.com/ Brian Lockett

My bad. I meant “slightly larger” base–I was meaning that even if PS4 has a slightly bigger base than Wii U, it’s still quite the achievement in just six months.

And I’m sorry if it takes more words to explain than it does to claim. Anyways, I didn’t expect this to stay long anyways. Folks rarely refute my points. lol Good day.

Darius

wow you’re arrogant. thats not the issue. stop acting like a women. i just don’t like to argue. there’s nothing more to it. I mean considering i was on the debate team through high school and college. im just done with it lol it has no appeal to me

lonewolf

And how will you know how something will be selling if you dont put it out on the market. You cant they will know only after they made their games available for the wii u (in this specific case). Everything else is a speculation.

http://valid.at val berger

If you really think industry works like this, then you don’t know industry. Or at least you believe those companies working there don’t know it. Good luck with your 300-employee driven company in the shadow of the financial crisis, I’m sure you’d bet on a horse like the WiiU too. Actually I am pretty sure indeed ;D

http://valid.at val berger

depends if you mean better for business or better for you. If I were a company that needs sales to survive, I don’t really know if I really would develop stuff for the WiiU although I personally love that system.

lonewolf

Its obvious what I said isnt it? I said that sales doesnt mean better console. Not for me nor for the developers but the system overall is better tas a hardware and as the games (software) it has.

http://valid.at val berger

now that you explained yourself, its obvious. the term ‘better’ isn’t like a scientific way to describe an attribute and what you claim is highly subjective. I personally also preferred the Gamecube over the PS2 but also know and understand many standpoints who think otherwise. What seems better to you can be worthless for others and vice versa.

lonewolf

Well looked from the point of how much the dreamcast sold should be a horrible console but is better than that its great awesome. Thats what I am trying to say that sales doesnt mean bad console.

Hipster Victor

It doesnt matter how powerful is the system. Its the audience it can sell to. The Wii u would be a good sell for Kingdom Hearts 3, since it makes more sense than xbox one

http://valid.at val berger

WiiU owners need to learn that due to Nintendo’s decision to work on PowerPC architecture, it’s made easy for devs to port XBox360 games right over, throw some Gamepad-touchmaps in and so on and that’s it. But while PS4 and XBone both share the same x86 architecture plus comparable tech specs, developers don’t just have to downgrade their games in terms of graphics quality but also change the whole architecture.
That’s two major steps that need to be taken just to run that game on the WiiU. In the case of Kingdom Hearts 3 you may be right as it may even work out as the target audience seems to fit very good – which doesn’t happen too often with 3rd party games on a nintendo platform – still those two reasons doesn’t make such a thing too obvious. What’s really frightening about this is: if industry is suffering on those two factors for a game like kingdom hearts, then you shouldn’t expect too many ports of PS4/XBone games anymore from now on, as devs are now starting to really get into that hardware which is gonna make it harder and harder porting stuff over to the WiiU.

http://macromanjr.blogspot.com/ Brian Lockett

I think there’s one more small point I would add: Fans of the game have been waiting almost 10 years for Kingdom Hearts III and are some of the staunchest fans around.

Even a Kingdom Hearts fan who’s a Nintendo fan owning a Wii U typically isn’t going to be willing to settle for a scaled-down experience on the Wii U when the game comes out in full-glory on PS4.

When you have a game this highly-anticipated, longtime fans demand the best-quality version. They’ll look no further than PS4.

Michael v.

i must be the odd one out then. i have no preference for how great a game looks. If they gave me a downgraded version for my wii u i’ll take it as is seeing as i’ve gone back to playing KH2 on my ps2 more often than any games that’s come out in the last 3 years.

And playing that game on a 40in flat screen does the visuals no justice but i just brush it off either way.

Graphics are always a nice touch to a game for me, but if it doesn’t play how i hope it would for a kingdom hearts game then it’s nice graphics hold very little to no charm at all for me.

point to this being, i don’t think its accurate to bunch everyone together thinking they all want the same thing as i know very few people who want a super detailed fancy kingdom hearts when it’s art style never really asked for it in the first place.

http://macromanjr.blogspot.com/ Brian Lockett

Horsepower isn’t always about graphics. They also affect how the game runs a bigger, richer world. The early trailer of KH3 showed it might have lot of animated characters on screen at once (all in 1080p at 60fps, no doubt). We’ll likely see larger levels thanks to next-gen capacity. I’d hate to see anything like that being scaled-down just so Wii U can better handle it.

Generally speaking, after waiting almost a decade, many Kingdom Hearts III fans expect the best treatment of this long-awaited game. Some folks want it on older consoles (like even the PS3), but they don’t seem to be the majority on fan sites, where you’ll see many looking forward to playing it in full glory on PS4.

Anyways, I wasn’t trying to bunch everyone together in saying they all want fancy graphics. I did use “typically.” Not all share the same sentiment, but just typically, many simply aren’t going to buy this game on Wii U. I don’t even think many KH3 who might already own a Wii U would settle for a scaled-down Wii U version. Not after 10 years of waiting.

Michael v.

Having bigger richer worlds is a nice touch to KH as the worlds were kind of small especially when you think about KH I having some of the shortest worlds like Wonderland, Olympus colosseum, and a few others.

1080p is fine and all not sure about 60fps though. it doesn’t seem like a game that would require that kind of frame rate. That’s mostly since i think console resources should be used towards better things like the larger worlds and such. 60fps suits more fast pace games like racing, or shooters apparently since a lot of people prefer that graphical preference. But all in all that’s all a matter of opinion since like you said you’d hate to see something like that scaled down while for me it doesn’t sway my judgement on it so long as i can play it o w o.

I can see many people looking forward to it on Ps4 since i’m sure the price point would be more affordable for some by the time the game releases. It’s all a matter of how much one is able to spend and how much more their willing to wait. Not everyone can be like current ps4 owners who drop 400 (excluding taxes) in single day. i’m surprised i even bought it since i keep myself to a $150 limit for two weeks since i get paid bi-weekly.

Maybe not many would buy it on Wii u, that all depends on how the market grow from here on out. I can be the same as to say not many would by it on the One since i don’t see them holding that high of a audience towards the KH series that has been exclusively on PS and Nintendo platforms ( console or handhelds ). The video game market has always been spontaneous it’s hard to see how anything will go with a certain console, or game as different factors can come in to play. All that’s left to really do now is just wait and see how it progress.

YappysDogTreats

Or even better, a World Ends With You sequel.

CaptRodgers

Off-topic, but does anyone know what time they update the Club Nintendo rewards? It’s supposed to be today and I’m waiting to see what they’ve added

darkcreap

Great. I hope they will feature games that use the gamepad, but not in a sense that it feels shoehorned or inconveniente, like some functionality of the Wii. I never quite liked to have to use motion in Donkey Kong Country Returns, but I loved how Twilight Princess, Skyward and, to some extent, how the Mario Galaxy games integrated the motion control.

So far, some of the games that I feel that use the gamepad well in a natural way are Rayman Legends, ZombiU and Wonderful 101. I hope Miyamoto has tried to achieve that in a natural, non-gimmicky, way.

JeanPaul

only 1.5 years later… oh well, better late than never…

Levi Johansen

Yeah, Nintendo did start well, with Nintendo Land and all, but then they expected third party devs to fill the gap while they finished Mario Kart, Super Smash, Zelda and so on.

They made the same mistake with the 3DS, I hope they’ve learned never to trust 3rd party devs to take initiative with new technology; they simply won’t.

darkcreap

Ubisoft did some good things with the gamepad though (see ZombiU and Rayman). Michel Ancel did it especially good with Rayman.

Fact2Game

As all publishers were complaining about first party domination on Nintendo before WII U. I think Nintendo tried to stay back and rallied with all 3rd party support. look at this FUCKERS http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-VqA_PupHs. After their back stabbing, Nintendo thought not to rely on any one but on them ONLY.

ben

This should be posted on every twitter account of these twits every day.

http://Website.com Shane Michaels

Finally.

matthew garcia

Hopefully it’s not Nintendoland type stuff but full fledged games

http://Website.com Shane Michaels

More Nintendoland is not what we need, but…
it’d be nice to have.

matthew garcia

It’s not bad but it would disappoint me

http://Website.com Shane Michaels

If it was all they had, I’d be very hateful.

http://www.youtube.com/user/TheMwgly Mwgly

Nintendo has to put up a few teams that also assist third parties.

DavidGLamb

Between Zelda, these new Gamepad-utilizing games, and possible 1st party announcements like Metroid, this may be one of their best! http://num.to/9379-7894-4349

John Andalora

Why didn’t you guys start doing this a year and a half ago????

darkcreap

Yep. It is incredible that, to the present date, Ubisoft has made a better use of the gamepad than them.

One thing positive I see from this: better to do the classic Nintendo games without shoehorning gamepad support. I think that happened a lot with the Wii and simply forcing people to use the the gamepad without it feeling natural is not a good idea. I never liked the motion controls in Donkey Kong Country Returns. I have always played with a pure button layout in Tropical Freeze, as in the SNES days.

But yes, you are pretty right, they should have tried and brought this kind of games much sooner. Better late than never, though. I am eagerly awaiting for this. I will try and keep my expectations low. They might bring a great new franchise… or just another “Dr Luigi” game.

ben

I am guessing they were crazy hung over with the success of the Wii. It was just a massive party at Nintendo as they rolled around in money laughing.

J.r. Storms

It’s like when Goku came back from the dead. Miyamoto is boss.

KartSmash

So are these games the big secret game that Miyamoto has been said to be working on for a while for Wii U? Or are these separate from that game?

Purple

Miyamoto is a legend im aware. But I cant think of a game hes made that ive liked recently. I dont much care for pikmin, I dont know if he oversaw 3D World but I didnt like it. I heard he had a heavy influence on skyward sword and I hated that zelda as well.
I dunno, I worry I wont be all that excited forhis IP reveal at E3. Im also worried I wont like this QOL stuff. I just want fun awesome games.

Paladinrja

Hated Skyward sword? Hah the joke on gaming is that an entire industry believes you are being honest. You never played it. I would suggest playing it on Wii U, but you don’t have one right?
Its really funny how all these down and out kids frustrated at life have turned into these young adults with the most malicously construed lies orchestrated in the most believable fashion which are themselves collated from the minor, normal, frustrations of people whom have actually done these things. – Whats worse is that there are alot of you.

Purple

Of course I tried playing it again on wii u . I couldnt get into it. I did replay Twilight Princess on Wii U and It looked even better. Don’t knoe how thats possible but its true.
No I see the potential in Wii U. I just havent seen it prove itself that it was worth me spending what I paid for it yet. Im sure it will eventually but so far I regret being an early adopter. Oh and I only own a Wii U for a home console.
The 3DS is great. Its got such a strong library.
Im just anxious and cant wait for Wii U to catch up to where id like it to be.

darkcreap

I played Twilight Princess and Skyward Sword too. While it had many good things:

-Good motion gameplay.
-Great story.
-Incredible music.

It had many other problems:

-Linearity.
-Lack of exploration.
-No secrets to be discovered in the map.
-Too much guidance. (Fi, I hate you!!).
-Dull puzzles.
-Boring dungeon layout. At least the first three dungeons were flat, if I remember correctly. Flat!! No more than one floor.

It is one of the strangest Zeldas ever. It completely broke from what a Zelda is supposed to be, with secrets all along the overworld, hidden caves, mysterious items and characters, etc.

It is incredible how they achieved two of the most important ingredients in a Zelda game and left so many other important things. The story was a nice change. Previous Zelda games had a nice story, but not as developed and well told as this in my opinion.

Had they not made a weak game in all the other aspects listed above, it would have been a Zelda game to remember for ages.

Magnus Gonzalez

I wasn’t that thrilled with Skyward Sword either. Seemed like they started it and got pretty far into it when they realized they’d never be able to achieve their vision on the underpowered Wii. To me I might be the worst Zelda. To each their own

darkcreap

I also have the sensation that they messed it up with it. I don’t know if it was for the power, but the game was pretty lacking for a 5 year development cycle. Maybe they were the DS Zeldas or maybe it was that they messed it up big time. It took them too long for a game that is pretty linear and lacks a proper overworld and secrets around it.

You know, it is like if they had been working on it for long, realised they were doing a lot of wrong things and had to finish the game in a rushed way, releasing the skeleton of a Zelda instead of a real Zelda game.

Maybe the fact that the sword play was dropped and then added again had something to do in the development cycle being more difficult than others. Just speculation, though. I guess only Nintendo knows what happened with Skyward.

Derek

The fact that he said they are mostly gamepad exclusive and nearly complete suggest to me these games are small like Dr Luigi

Squid

As long as they aren’t annoying gimmicks I will gladly take it. For Zelda I like the idea of aiming the bow and arrow with the gamepad (or with the right stick), I never got a hang of shooting things with two analog sticks.

http://www.redbubble.com/people/toastedmoose/ SpareChnge

You know what, as good an fun E3 is, it also sucks.

If Nintendo has something up their sleeve and they know it will sell something and they HAVE to wait until E3 to show it, it is only killing them, the more that time goes by, the longer the wait for games, the less sales for the system. I own a Wii U and I love this machine LOVE IT!

Just release the stuff! There is no time to delay! ARGH!

But I understand the reasoning of waiting, but I think it is moot now that people are starting to want instant gratification.

Carl Fin

Everything in nintendoland (demoland) has been released as a stand alone or will be released as a stand alone title in some shape or form including………

nin-10-doughfan

like……..YEAH!!!!!!

http://www.mpt-online.eu/ Sylux

Always interesting to see what Mr. Miyamoto has been working on, some great gamepad features are very nice although personally I prefer to play with the Pro controller. But I can imagine countless of things to use the gamepad for, Fatal Frame and Metroid alone already have almost endless posibiities. So yes, very curious what Mr. Miyamoto has been working on

DragonSilths

Good, let him do what he does best. Be involved with making games.

Santanata

DIE GAMEPAD DIE

William Cole

Show me and I will touch.

And if it is some stupid NFC mario game I’m done.

WellWisher

Hope they’re not all minigame collections. Nintendoland is enough.

Spaniard0069

Off Tv gameplay is a good enough feature for me. Also having access to maps and inventory screens on a separate screen. However I would definitely purchase a sequel to Nintendo Land. I have played that with my wife and kids for dozens of hours since launch and it still gets played once a week.

Herman Jacob

i wont hold my breath. Whoever is designing features for GP at Ubisoft is who I’d hire. (Zombi U, Rayman, Watchdogs…)

Josh Warren

By far the best video game company ever! Nintendo rules!

ben

What I want from a game pad game is an RTS crossed with an Action game. for example I want to battle in a spaceship in starfox game while being the general of a fleet in a huge space battle. I want to multitask till my ears bleed.

darkcreap

The gamepad’s second screen has been used as a communication device, like in Lego City Undercover. For Starfox would be insane.

Rodger_Ramjet

I don’t give a shit what others think of the WiiU. It’s the best machine by far. I can’t wait to see what Nintendo demonstrate with the GAMEPAD. Will be awesome

Marioman21

Yes this sounds awesome I can not wait to see what Shiggy did.

http://macromanjr.blogspot.com/ Brian Lockett

If only Nintendo would buy or sponsor some of the most promising among indie developers with ambitious ideas and promising progress.

Not that I put all my stock in indie games, but I think if anyone can exhibit the GamePad’s real potential, it’s indie developers who already play outside the rules of game design.

They’ll probably show the world how to use the GamePad cleverly better than any major company will, besides Nintendo themselves.

verymetal

Better late than never, I guess.

Archibald Crews

Finally. I was hoping the lack of first party games was due to working on games, and more importantly games that actually used the clunky pad.

beez1717

I hope these games are not ones which totally turn off the hardcore market and causes the hate on the pad to get even bigger….